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The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely diplomat for the White House's newest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. His close relationship with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of Donald Trump latest effort to settle the conflict.

Before his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a mediator or diplomat, and his initial attempts to promote the deal to European policymakers were labeled chaotic.

His strong relationship with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, signal the resurgence of the isolationist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who intervened during Ukraine's president's rocky initial trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again resisting pressure from the US to accept a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have called a surrender.

After a chaotic first year in office, foreign policy actions in the White House are said to be influenced by a handful of Trump's top aides, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a vocal advocate of the latest plan, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, together with the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every criticism of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misinterprets the framework or misstates some critical situation on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Efforts and EU Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of running from their constituents, who Vance said held restrictionist and conservative positions similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new peace deal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a peace framework that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a truce that honored Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to each party, and stop the war from restarting.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “It might be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with obtaining a agreement on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Concerns

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the government who has gone from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more stable standing.

Rubio was a member of a US delegation that went to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian officials to help refine the initial 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complicated and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “Furthermore, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate each party to agree to difficult but necessary compromises. That is why we are and will continue to develop a list of possible ideas for resolving this conflict drawing from input from each party of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the proposal. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to clarify that the deal was just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary made a call to us this afternoon and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was presented to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he later wrote. “The framework is presented as a strong framework for ongoing negotiations. It is derived from input from the Moscow. However, it is additionally informed by previous and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”